Miami Sound Machine

Released just after Cuts Both Ways and a year before her Greatest Hits compilation, Exitos de Gloria Estefan rounds up the key highlights among the singer's Spanish-language recordings for Sony Discos. Expected inclusions like "Conga" and "Don't Wanna Lose You" are here, of course, albeit in Spanish (though "Here We Are" is oddly here in its Portuguese version). More notably, however, Exitos de Gloria Estefan also rounds up unexpected inclusions, some of which never had English-language hit counterparts. "Renacer" is a remake of the title track from Miami Sound Machine's debut album from way back in 1977, for instance, while "Dingui-Li Bangui" is a wonderful song that will be new to most English-language-inclined listeners. And too, the English-language "Dr. Beat" is a welcome inclusion, for it's a catchy and fun dance-pop song from 1984 that was unfortunately left off the Greatest Hits collection. Most of Miami Sound Machine's less commercially successful albums remained out of print for years, so Exitos de Gloria Estefan is one of the few relatively available albums featuring these songs.